Noguchi Museum × Ikenobo: 40 Years in New York — A Living Tradition of Flowers and Space

The Noguchi Museum in Long Island City presents a two-day special exhibition on October 17 and 18, marking the 40th anniversary of the Ikenobo Ikebana Society's New York City Chapter. The display takes place in the Education Studio on Level C.

Ikenobo is the oldest and most enduring school of ikebana, founded in Kyoto more than 550 years ago. Its practice begins with close observation of nature and considers how plants relate to space, season and the human spirit. The exhibition sets this living art beside the sculpture of Isamu Noguchi, asking how nature, form and emptiness lend meaning to one another.

The parallel is a natural one. Both Noguchi's sculpture and ikebana treat balance and tension, movement and stillness as the basic material of composition. Visitors are invited to see flowers as sculptural expressions of time, place and attentive looking rather than as simple decoration.

On view are approximately 45 arrangements made by distinguished masters and members of the Ikenobo New York City Chapter. The show brings together tradition, artistry and cultural exchange, and for Japanese-speaking readers in New York it offers a chance to encounter a centuries-old Kyoto practice inside the museum devoted to a Japanese American sculptor.

Because the run lasts only a weekend, plan ahead. The exhibition is free with museum admission. The museum is at 9-01 33rd Road, at Vernon Boulevard, in Long Island City. A related program, Mindfulness in the Galleries: Ikebana, follows on November 14.